Supreme Court of New Zealand

5 July 2007

MEDIA RELEASE – FOR IMMEDIATE PUBLICATION

Qiu Jiang v The Queen
(SC 41/2006) [2007] NZSC 51

PRESS SUMMARY

This summary is provided to assist in the understanding of the Court’s judgment. It does not comprise part of the reasons for that judgment.

The full judgment with reasons is the only authoritative document. The full text of the judgment and reasons can be found at www.courtsofnz.govt.nz.

The Supreme Court has unanimously allowed Qiu Jiang’s appeal against her conviction for blackmail and ordered a new trial. It did so because of deficiencies in the trial Judge’s directions to the jury.

The evidence against the appellant very largely consisted of accounts given by the complainant and his wife of threats to injure the complainant if he failed to pay a debt. On one occasion the threats were said to have been made personally by the appellant. Other threats were said to have been made in telephone calls to the complainant by unknown persons who had said they were acting on the instructions of the appellant.

The Judge told the jury that it could bring in its verdict on alternative bases that the appellant was either acting alone or with others. But the Judge had not explained how the jury could use the evidence of telephone threats by others, including particularly the references to the complainant which were hearsay if relied on as proof that she had in fact instructed the telephone callers what to say.

ENDS

See... Judgment: Jiang v The Queen (PDF)

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